Learning to Thrive
by GreenBean2014
Summary: AU: What if the infamous couple had met long before that night in the bar? Long enough to allow them to develop a healthy relationship so when they show up at the hospital as junior resident and attending they are happily married. There will be heartbreak, and there will be joy. **Will Update every Sunday
1. Chapter 1

There is a significant difference between surviving and thriving in life. There's the textbook definition of surviving: to continue to live or exist, especially in spite of danger or hardship, and the definition of thriving: to grow or develop well or vigorously. Now, there is a threefold thought process in this significant distinction, the concept is widely used by those who study the well-being of the human body, there are the physical, emotional, and spiritual categories of distinction.

The obvious physical aspect of growing is easy to comprehend. The body naturally grows – baring any medical conditions or childhood deficits that could stunt the natural growth. If the body grows; it survives. To thrive in the physical body takes a person's own effort. The human body is a temple. In order to build the temple, labor must be put into it. That means, a little bit of a physical exercise and some healthy eating would work as a great foundation.

Continuing forward, there's the emotional aspect. Now, in this way of speaking it will be geared towards the idea of maturity. The simple growth of maturity occurs due to living and experiencing what life has to offer. The acquaintances who are met, the situations that are thrust upon a person, or even the thoughts that run through a person's head. Again, if the person can live through the situation thrown to him or her, than he or she has survived such crisis. The thriving comes into play when a person choses to learn from those life experiences and take part in them rather that allowing the world to simply revolve around him or herself. Maturity occurs when people learn from their mistakes; and when they find a way to actively control their thought process. When the person takes control of his or her own life rather than watching the world continue on: thriving is achieved.

Lastly, and most certainly the most important, is the spiritual growth. A person can certainly grow with God and hold a relationship with God. Growing with God simply means to learn more about Him and to obtain more head knowledge. Surviving is tricky is this case because one could argue that a person could survive without the belief in God. However, since this is spiritual well-being, spiritual health is dependent on the belief in something. So, a person does need to believe in something in order to nourish his or her spiritual health. Thriving in the aspect of the belief of God means to develop a relationship with God and to know Him as a father, then acting upon that relationship to dedicate life to Him.

It's quite simple, growth is something that is natural and something human beings just don't have control over. Thriving is a task that requires intentional effort. However, both are ongoing tasks. Thriving is just something that so many fail at continuously or have no interest in. As for Meredith Grey, she was didn't care. Her only goal was to survive. If she could survive the day, all would be well. "Just get through today," she'd tell herself. One more breath, one more step, one more day.

In the middle of her last semester of junior year at college, she begrudgingly made her way to her one of her many, many science classes. Grunt work, as she called it. It wasn't that she didn't like science, it was mere idea that she was learning material that she would never use again simply to earn her degree. She had finished her pre-medicine requests her first two years at college and was left with the remaining classes to get her degree. It was becoming frustrating. She herself was becoming irritated. Class was long and boring as she had predicted, but before she left, her professor stopped her. "Ms. Grey, I was hoping to ask you something in private. Would you mind meeting me in my office in thirty minutes?" he asked. The man was a lovely gentleman. Kind and caring, so she didn't think twice before agreeing to his request.

After a quick stop downstairs in the science building to grab lunch, she returned to his office only to find not only her professor but also about three of her appointed advisors along with so other people who looked as through they held high positions in the university sitting around drinking coffee. Whatever they were laughing about had settled down when she entered the room, but their smiles remained. "Have a seat," one of the many intimidating people requested. It didn't come off as a demand, but she felt as though it was. She quickly sat, and looked to the ground and awaited a punishment as she went through her head for whatever she could've possibly done wrong. "Before you start worrying," her professor started.

 _Too late_ , she thought.

"We all just wanted to look over your schedule and we have decided that we want to offer you a position at that research facility that is in affiliation with university," he finished.

For a moment she was absolutely speechless. After collecting her bearings, she mustered up a barely audible "Yes, of course."

"Great, you'll start on Monday!" exclaimed an elder gentleman to her left who she didn't recognize. He must've been from the research facility.

"Now, I know you have a full course load, and you're also working on a research project on neurological defects, but I truly feel that this would be beneficial for you. I think having a job in the research are will give you some much needed experience. Since today is Wednesday, why don't you stop by on Friday to Human Resources to get your ID tag, fill out the paperwork, and we'll show you around the place. The rest of us will leave while Dr. Hastings explains what your job will be," her professor finished.

Meredith felt like is was a whirlwind of information so she simple shook her head yes, and the over crowded office emptied. She learned that Dr. Hastings, the man to her left, was indeed from the research institute. He was extremely kind and patient. The position she was offered was a safety instructor. Apparently, the entire institute had just recently "lost" their last employee due "personal reasons", so they were desperate to find a replacement quickly. As she was majoring in biochemistry and seemed to excel in it, she had been recommended for the job by her advisors. With a large packet that seemed to be thicker than her biochemistry book and the standard welcome packet she walked back to her apartment, threw herself on the bed, and picked up her phone dialing her friend who lived in the apartment right below her.

"Cristina," she exhaled, "I think I just sold my soul to the devil."

"Oh please, he already had you when you started dating that ex of yours, what was his name?" Christina practically cackled.

"Okay, we are not going back there. I mean it this time. I seriously won't have a social life or any type of life for that matter. This is getting to be ridiculous. I thought I could handle the six classes. Then I could do the research project. I could even take the ministry course so I could work on being "whole and healed". Then, out of no where, my advisors throw this at me. They want me to be a safety instructor at the research institute."

"You, a SI? Oh, that's just hilarious. That's like putting you in the kitchen to cook."

"You release you're supposed to be my friend right?"  
"Yes, and as your friend, I say, you my friend are screwed. Good luck. We still on for Friday night drinks?"

Cristina had just turned twenty-one and was anxious to buy alcohol on her own. Boosting to Meredith about how she was legal and everything. Meredith, being a year behind all of her friends in age was still twenty, so she couldn't do anything yet.

"Only if you're paying."

"Done deal. Gotta go. I have class."

"It's okay, I'll just be drowning myself in paperwork. I'm serious. They killed a forest just to give me my job description."

After hearing a brief cackle from Cristina on the phone, the line went dead, so Meredith decided to get a jump start on her work before she lost her motivation.

The days had come and gone, soon enough it was Monday. After being briefed on her duties thrice more, shown her office, the basic wings of the institute, and the staff areas, Meredith set off to her office to move in a few files that she knew she'd need immediately to do her job. She was given a pager and told that as the new safety instructor of the entire building she would be called in for every emergency that occurred and would have to file the reports along with paperwork that followed. At that remark, she rolled her eyes, but decided to not be too annoyed considering she was planning on attending medical school and her life would be filled with endless pages.

Once her office had been sufficiently organized Meredith decided to wonder the halls of the institute. Walking by the labs, she recognized the biology labs, the psychology labs, the physics tutorials, and even the statistics lecture room. Finally, she found the entire chemistry department which happened to be significantly larger than what it had seemed during her brief tour. As, SI of the building Meredith had access to all of the rooms, so she made her way into the the third laboratory she found and decided to look around. What she found terrified her. There were so many breaches of safety protocol that she finally decided to just leave and find a plan of action. Right as she left, a tall man who was clearly older than her, but not old enough to be professor or any position beyond a fellow, stood there staring at her.

"Are you the cause for this mess?" Meredith all but accused him.

"Umm… No… Well, yes, I, mean. No. Some of it," he stumbled on his words.

 _Great_ , she thought, no wonder this is such a mess. The laboratory is being run by people with mental deficits.

"Are you able to speak clearly without stumbling on your own words?" she tried again, this time with a softer tone.

"Yes, it's just, we don't normal have girls here, and you are quite young,"

"Meredith Grey. New SI," She stuck out her right hand to offer a shake.

After returning the handshake,

"Derek Shepherd. Chemistry Ph.D fellow and M.D."


	2. Chapter 2

Meredith had been working at her new job for a month and it was official. She hated it. There was no sugar-coating the job; there were no upsides. It was just miserable. She would take her classes, do her extra ministry hours, go to work, deal with "idiots", and come home to complain to Cristina about her job. "I'm telling you," she ranted one particularly difficult day, "it is a nightmare."

"Like I said, you're screwed," Cristina laughed back. The two were sitting on her bed watching some horribly inaccurate medical TV show.

"These fellows might be smart, but they could care less about safety protocols. I swear I saw one actually cooking their lunch with a Bunsen burner yesterday."

"This is why I am a teaching assistant."

"You sleep with that professor… I'm talking about real a job."

"That is a real job. Real strenuous if you ask me."

"Never mind your escapades. I'm telling you these people are first class idiots."

The two fell back into comfortable silence while the episode continued. They had already talked about their classes and their love lives, or lack there of, so all that remained was work.

"All I'm saying is I should've never taken the job," Meredith broke the silence once again when the show cut to commercial. Cristina let out a very loud groan.

"Look, it's not like it's a gift. It didn't come with a gift receipt; you can't return it. There has to be one friend that you made to make it not suck as much."

One glare answered it all. Dropping the topic, they eventually fell asleep. At two in the morning Meredith's pager went off.

"Are you kidding me?" she threw the pager across the room.

"What are you complaining about now? It's two in the morning and we have class in about six hours," Cristina grumbled into the pillow.

"It's that job. That hell of a job that's driving me to insanity. You think I'm exaggerating, come with me. I'll grant you privileges. Let's go." Meredith grabbed fresh clothes from her dresser.

"Ugh. I am tired!" Cristina yelled but also got up and stole clothes from Meredith.

The trip to the research institute was quicker than what Cristina would have imagined considering how long Meredith usually takes to get there. Upon entering the building, Meredith flashed her badge to security and also introduced Cristina as her guest. Meredith walked with an incredibly quick pace for having just been woken up fifteen minutes prior. They stopped by Meredith's office, which had been fully decorated by that point, to pick up incident files and then made their way to an unknown wing of the facility.

"Where are we going Mer? I'm all for adventure, but I'd like to at least talk a little," Cristina half joked.

"Chemistry wing. It's always the chemistry department," Meredith didn't even look up while she was filling out the preliminary report.

"Wait, isn't that where you were telling me about that guy Derek?"

"We still two more flights of stairs to climb, please don't make them more painful than they already are," Meredith clicked her pen and shoved it into her lab coat that was mandated by the facility.

Upon entering the obvious chemical department Christina was surprised to find that there were five to seven firefighters in the lab that Meredith had taken her to. They were talking to older gentlemen who were dressed in lab coats that didn't match Meredith's. There were also a group of much younger men standing off to the side talking amongst themselves.

"See, why do you get all the hot guys?" Cristina complained.

"Who? Those guys?" Meredith pointed to the group of guys, who were now shoving each other effectively causing a beaker to fall off the counter, shattering into a million pieces along with spilling its most probable hazardous contents onto the floor. She pulled out another incident report.

"Sure, might not be the brightest bunch, but they are definitely hot," Cristina continued.

"I don't have time for this, I need to talk to the fire department. Feel free to talk to the "hot guys". Also, Derek's in that bunch," Meredith sulked off to find the fire captain.

Since the fire department usually parked in the back of the building it wasn't unusual for Meredith to not see them before entering the building. However, had she known they were there, she would have definitely come without Christina. She had only received a page informing her about a possible accident in the chemistry department. Something large enough to warrant waking her up to fill out an incident report. If there was one thing she had most certainly learned while working at this job, the chemistry department never goes home. If anything, that was the department she wanted to go home and not come back.

"Thank you Steve," she finished up the conversation.

"No problem Ms. Grey, and like I said, you should talk to Dr. Shepherd. He seemed to know the most about what happened," he nodded and put his helmet back on.

"Will do and Steve, it's Meredith," she smiled.

They shared one last laugh over the entire incident itself and departed. Meredith took a deep breath and mentally prepared herself for the encounter with Derek. She had already received the statements from all the supervising researchers and documented their details, now she just needed his final say and she could go home.

"Dr. Shepherd. Front and center," she called out.

"Ohhh…. Someone's in trouble with mom," one of the other fellows whispered not so quietly to Derek.

"Hello Meredith what can I do ya for?" He sauntered up to her and leaned over the lab table. Meredith give him a hard look up and down. He was giving her his eyes. His "get out of jail free" eyes. He had batted those eyes once to her and she had made the mistake of letting an incident report slip. Now, every time something happens, he bats the eyes. Then she looked at his hair. His hair. What normal person has perfectly styled hair at two in the morning? This was most certainly not helping with her whole "let it go" philosophy.

"It's Ms. Grey to you."

"Alright then, Ms. Grey. What can I do for you?"

Ignoring his obvious seductive tone, she continued with her harsh dialect.

"I need your account of what happened here tonight seeing as though it appears to be your fault. Again."

"It was not… Alright, contrary to popular belief, it was not my fault. My partner had simply forgotten to turn the gas off while we were lighting a couple open flames. Things may have gotten out of control."

"May have gotten out of control was long ago when I was rudely awoken to come and fill out paperwork so your research can still be funded. So, let's finish this up."

"Have I told you how beautiful you look?"

"That's it, just take this piece of paper, write you statement, and it better be on my desk tomorrow morning. If it isn't legible, I will make you type it, sign it, and then I'll suspend your privileges here for a week. Am I understood Dr. Shepherd?" she was irritated and sleep deprived.

"Yes mother."

Not bothering to entertain that with a response she simply turned on her heel and left the room.

"Wow, you really dug into him. Do you like him?" Cristina asked.

"This isn't kindergarten. We don't hit the people like. What's wrong with you?" Meredith asked as they made their way back to her office.

"Geez. What crawled up your butt and died."

"Look, I'm sorry. It's just. It's now three in the morning and I now have over thirty pages of paperwork to fill out by six this afternoon on top of my regular schedule. I hate getting paged in, especially when it's due to someone's ignorance or stupidity."

Cristina just nodded in understanding and decided to let it go. They went home and decided that sleep was a lost cause.

"All I'm saying is, most of the time when someone "hates" someone like him that much, usually there are feelings behind it."

"Would you drop it Cristina?"

"Okay, okay… But I'm positive he likes you."

 **A/N: Just a few things, yes eventually they will be moving over to the hospital scene. If anyone knows an awesome beta reader, let me know. Lastly, I'll be trying to update weekly.**


	3. Chapter 3

Time was passing slowly, so incredulously slowly. Maybe she'd be okay with it if it was because it was her third round of exams that upcoming week. Maybe she'd be more at peace if it were because she had taken up extra ministry hours to help those poor little sick kids at the camp. Hell, she might have even been pacified with it had it been because Cristina seemed to have fallen off the grid and stopped answering her phone calls and texts. However, she was certainly not okay with the fact that Dr. Derek Shepherd was determined to make her life hell on earth at work. In fact, she was certain that was the sole reason for earth's decision to slow its rotation.

Only two weeks had passed since she had paged in for the close call and brought Cristina in with her. That, however, was not out of the ordinary. What she used as the time tracker unfortunately was something Cristina had said and couldn't get out of her head. "I know he likes you." Now, Meredith was a smart, intelligent girl. She knew that Cristina had spent time with those guys beforehand. Had he professed his feelings for her in front of the rest of the fellows? Or was she so distracted by his cocky attitude that she neglected to see his true feelings for her? Never the less, it didn't matter. She couldn't put with him. Not because she didn't want to, but more because she didn't have time to. Derek made sure of that. Oh wait, Dr. Shepherd made sure of that.

In the two weeks that she thought she had time to figure out that mess, she actually had time to fill out seven incident reports just because of him. That didn't include the rest of the building. No, she could pretend that she didn't see that fire down hallway B right? That gas leak that the physics department caused by shooting a rocket indoors didn't exist right? She could just talk to the theoretical physics and have them whip up an equation about hypotheticals and put that down as the incident report. Each day that passed, her loathing for the job increased by the tenfold.

She lay on her bed on stared at the ceiling with a blank expression. She honestly didn't think she had time for emotions anymore at this point. That's when her pager went off for the umpteenth time that day. With an inward groan, she got up, got in her car, and drove herself blindly to the oh so familiar building. Surprised, it wasn't an emergency that greeted her, it was Dr. Hastings.

"Ah, Ms. Grey! I can't say how wonderful it is to see you!" His white beard and joyous smile made her want to punch him even harder in the face.

"Well I didn't have much of a choice seeing as you paged me," she tried to smile back, she sure hoped she was smiling.

"Why don't you join us in the board room?" He put an arm around her shoulder in a very father-like fashion and guided her to the elevators.

"Sir?" she allowed herself to be guided out of mere exhaustion more than compliance.

"The directors and I have been through some serious discussions and we have some topics we'd like to discuss with you," he trailed off as the elevator quickly made its way to the top floor.

Meredith sighed and closed her eyes. _I couldn't have a simple life_ , she thought, _I couldn't just suck at my job._

They walked into a very large room that overlooked the college town. It held a large, dark wooden table and sat eight tall office chairs, six of which were already occupied. Dr. Hastings took his seat and motioned for Meredith to take the remaining one at the end. Meredith knew how board of directors ran. There had been speculation and what to follow did not mean good things for her. Each director was a head of their own department. Including academics, funding, security, attorney, and safety. As far as Meredith knew, she didn't report to anybody and she knew her office was far to big to be true.

"We've been quite pleased with your performance Ms. Grey," Dr. Hastings started.

"Dr. Hastings, with all due respect, I'm sitting in a seat that should have someone sitting in it. I've been working at a job without a superior for almost two months now, I think I might now what's next," Meredith interrupted, her voice hoarse from lack of sleep.

"Well yes, that was part of our discussion. The second part, detailed your first assignment as the official position in that seat. As you may have noticed, there have been an alarmingly high amount of incidents lately. Ever since our last safety director…. Left… we have been in the blind. So, many of the laboratories are missing evacuation plans, blueprints, safety protocols, things of the sort," Dr. Hastings had lost eye contact with Meredith and started looking at the ground. Meredith, staring at the elder with utter disbelief, just blinked.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"I said-" he was cut off.

"No, I understand that. I'm trying to understand how a highly respected research facility allows this to happen! I mean, where's your building manager? What would've happened if there were an actual incident? Doesn't this spark you as more than irresponsible? Aren't you supposed to be the adults? What the hell is wrong with everyone?" Not being able to take anymore of the complete disarray that was her life, Meredith took off in her car and drove home.

Finding herself once again on her bed staring at her ceiling, Meredith felt an overwhelming urge to throw objects at the ceilings. She used to throw sharpened pencils at a soft ceiling before when she couldn't take her life anymore. So, she picked up her phone and even though she knew Cristina would most likely not pick up, called her, "Cris, I need alcohol."

She drove herself into homework to calm herself down and when there was nothing left, she had somewhat calmed down enough to turn her phone back on to see if work had called. To her dismay, but not surprise, they had contacted multiple times. Along with an additional missed phone call she had no intention of returning yet. Meredith figured she had hidden long enough so, she went ahead and return to the hellhole. Work. She definitely meant work. Dr. Hastings was kind enough to meet her at the door as if he expected her. She hadn't even called ahead. _Wonderful_ , she thought, _Now I can't leave_.

"Welcome back Ms. Grey. After your quick departure, we thought you might have run for the hills." Why on God's green earth was the man still smiling? Meredith had half a mind to wipe that smile off his face right that moment.

"I did run for the hills. I only came back because I need to use my phone at some point; and when you constantly call me, I can't use it," she bit back.

"Well, have you considered helping us with our problem?"

"Considered it. Decided on it. Working on fixing it," she had already started walking to her office. Oddly, Dr. Hastings had followed her.

"Great! This also means you'll be taking the board position which means we're going to adjust your salary pay."

"Yes, because that's what I was worried about. Money. Not that fact that I could be in this building, and it could burn down, and not one soul would know what to do," Meredith unlocked her office and angrily grabbed a slew of binders that had some floor plans in them. "I need the building manager in my office. Now."

"I'll get him on the phone. But, I think he left when our previous safety director left," Dr. Hastings stuttered. His face turned an unhealthy shade of red.

"Let me guess. Personal issues." Meredith was not in the least bit amused. In fact, she was just frustrated at this point. She felt like she had just been put on a sinking ship and given orders to make it float without its engineer. In fact, this was the Titanic, and she was here to say the iceberg was straight ahead. Also, here's the steering wheel, is it bad that it seems to have fallen off?

Dr. Hastings let out a muffled sigh and left the room sensing that Meredith really didn't want to discuss the matter further. She gathered what she needed and prepared a binder to go downstairs to the lobby. As her office was inconveniently placed on the fifth floor of the seven story building, she literally ran everywhere because nothing was adjacent to her office. The elevator doors opened revealing none other than the infamous Dr. Derek Shepherd and his idiotic friend who was attached at his hip. Dr. Sloan, Meredith thought his name was. There were a couple sexual harassment claims on him with Human Resources. She walked into the elevator, pressed lobby, and started organizing her binder trying to ignore his presence.

"Hello Meredith," his voice calm, non-intimidating, and most certainly not an innuendo to anything further if she was honest with herself.

"I can't." Meredith just couldn't that day. She couldn't handle him. So, when the people got off at the next floor, she got off as well. It's not that she didn't trust herself, it's because she couldn't stand being in the elevator with him for five more floors.

"Dude, she pressed the bottom level and got out after one level. She'd rather walk six flights of stairs than talk to you," she heard Dr. Sloan tell Derek.

She really couldn't think about that, she had more pressing things to deal with than to get trapped in an elevator with incompetent fellows or to possibly be yet another victim of Dr. Sloan's HR paperwork nightmare. She had a building to make sure people were safe in and projects that she had to make sure would still get funded.

After dropping off a new protocol for ID badges for guests in the building and talking to the head of security, she made her way back to the chemistry department to start posting the emergency evacuation plans that she had made at home. While working on the C wing, her assistant found her to tell her that there was a guest for her in the lobby. Now, that confused Meredith. Nobody ever visited her.

Hesitantly she made her way back down and to her surprise she found he estranged, deranged other half; Cristina. For the first time that day, a smile broke through her lips. She grabbed the girl's arm and drug her up to her office. "You would not believe my life." Meredith started.

"Uh. Hello, I went AWOL for two weeks and we make this about you? Plus, I brought you alcohol," Cristina threw herself on Meredith's couch and dropped a bag what Meredith assumed to be alcohol next to her feet.

"Alright, fine, pleasantries. Where have you been? How are you?"

"I've been great. I was on a study abroad trip with that professor. It was absolutely fabulous. Oh the places you'll see,"

"Great. I have a building that fall apart any minute and now I'm a member of the board. Oh, and I'm twenty."

"Yeah well, twenty-one isn't all that great. It just comes with alcohol. Granted the alcohol would solve your other problems. Did you finally fix your Derek problem?"  
"I don't have a 'Derek' problem. Even if I did, I wouldn't have time to fix it because I don't even have time to eat or have emotions." Meredith grunted and threw her head in her arms on her desk.

"Well I have a bunch of work to catch up on. I just wanted to drop off your gift and see if you fixed your boy problems. Hopefully the gift will fix the other. Bye Mer." And with a flash of black her friend gone. Her only lifeline to sanity was gone. She absent-mindedly put her head back on the desk with an exhausted sigh and allowed a few tears of anger or pure frustration leave her eyes.

After collecting herself, she went about and posted the remaining evacuation plans to the main laboratories seeing as those were cause for main concern. While she didn't really want to, she also looked over the federal guidelines and had made a startling discovery. In order for the research facility to keep up with protocol, they needed to hold drills for all types of disaster scenarios quarterly. The only reason they had maintained afloat since she had been there was simply due to the reason that those disaster scenarios had occurred due to the lack of preventative measures. Meredith wanted to collapse in her office in a pile of tears. She knew she had to run a lockdown drill because they hadn't had one that quarter yet. While yes, it was great there were no shooters, potential hostages, or other unforeseeable circumstance, she almost wished there had been. That way this drill wouldn't need to happen and maybe, just maybe, Darwin's gene theory of survival of the fittest might have played out. _Alright_ , she thought, _that was mean. Maybe those ministry classes aren't paying off yet._

She sat back down at her desk and made some lengthy calls to the local police department who had ironically been expecting her contact. They set up the immediate drill and decided to run it down within the next hour. Meredith pulled the head of security into her office and explained the drill, then had everyone set up in their positions.

In one hour three figures dressed all in black infiltrated the facility. They drew their weapons and shot the poor, innocent secretary who neglected to call for security the moment they didn't show their ID badge in the chest, with a paint ball gun. _Wonderful,_ Meredith thought sarcastically, _we're off to a brilliant start_. The men made their way up the stairs "taking down" three personal who crossed their path. Finally, one older researcher from the psychology department on the first floor immediately called security and 911. She had a odd look on her face when she reported that her colleagues were being shot down by a paint ball gun, then being told to stay down by their safety director, but she managed to make the call.

Meredith just followed the "shooters" from a hidden distance and kept tally on the victims while taking report on how everyone responded. It felt great to know that it only took a dozen deaths for them to realize that maybe they should contact their safety director and put the facility on lockdown seeing as though security was only working with the police to extract the shooters. It was the safety director's job for the safety of all those inside the building and putting out the mass page and overheard alarm for a building lockdown. As soon as her pager went off that she had been "notified" of the situation, she immediately went into action. She put the building on lookdown, and started taking a tally of all the personal who had been scanned in for the day to give to the police.

As the SI she was the only person allowed to roam the hallways, preferably with the police chief. Building policy dictated for everyone to stay put and use what they had to try and take down the offender. Meredith followed the "shooters" and watched the scenes unfold and she was blown away with how the facility personal were responding. These people had doctorates or were fellows, and they were cowering in the back of the room with all the lights on. Not even bothering to lock to door. Then when the shooters would draw their weapons, they would immediately put their arms up in surrender, completely ignoring the fact they have items to throw at the attackers right next them. The physicists had actual knives to throw, the psychologists had a door behind them that they could've actually run away, and the statisticians were too busy working to even realize that the building was on lock down.

Nothing surpassed to idiocy of the chemists though. When she followed the shooters to the chemistry department, after they swapped out their paintball guns for the twentieth time, she found all of the chemists in one lab working on one very caustic, very hazardous chemical experiment without proper personal protective equipment. When the shooters came into the lab, all of the chemists turned their heads surrendered, and one voice spoke for all.

"Can you wait to shoot us until after this has finished synthesizing?"

"Of course it's you, Dr. Shepherd. It's always you. What is wrong with you? What's wrong with all of you? First of all, you have shooters coming in here threatening your lives and the first thing you do is surrender. You could just throw your project at them and it would incapacitate them long enough for all of you to get away. Instead you ask them, kindly, to finish the project?" She was annoyed, frustrated, and so beyond done with that hell of a day. "Lastly, incident report for all of you for not wearing proper PPE for this off the books experiment you decided to run." All the chemists just looked at her with confused looks on their faces and she swore all she could hear was the stupid chemical bubbling.

"Just shoot them and move on," she finally said to the hired crew before sighing and walking out of the lab.

After the drill had been finalized, Meredith had just about had it. She talked to the police chief and the hired crew who made quite a few jokes about the entire ordeal. She just laughed and said agreed that it was a failed drill, but at least it counted as a drill. Overall, about two – hundred had been "killed" during the run through. She knew people were ill-trained and ill-equipped, but she had no idea just how bad. If she were being honest with herself, it was dark outside and most of the conversations were getting fuzzy to her. She wasn't entirely certain what was going on anymore. She needed sleep.

She made her way back up to her office to at least look at the dreaded paperwork she would have to do for this hell of a drill. When she sat down, she noticed the bag of alcohol that Cristina had brought over earlier. _Wouldn't hurt to crack that open_ , she thought to herself, _not like I'm going anywhere anytime soon_. She pulled out a bottle of tequila. Boy did Cristina know her so well. Not even bothering to put it into a cup, she took yet another swig from the bottle when she heard a knock at the door. The person didn't even wait for a response before he allowed himself in.

"Drinking on the job. Doesn't seem very safe to me."

"I think you are the last person to lecture me on safety, Dr. Shepherd."

"Still. Underage, and at a highly regarded research facility. I think that's frowned upon."

"Are you here for something?" She asked not bothering to look up from her desk.

"My incident report, all filled out and legible," he said while dropping the papers in her drop box and flashing her his smile with the eyes. Those eyes.

"I should have you suspended for the stunt you pulled today."

"But you won't."

"I won't," she finally looked up and made eye contact. Darn that sleep deprivation and alcohol, she thought. None of her thoughts were making sense.

There was music. That was her first thought. She blindly reached over, grabbed her phone, and turned off the alarm by habit. Wait. She most certainly was not in her own bed. In fact, she sat up really quickly. _Ouch_ , she had bumped her head on something hard. She looked up and around, that would be the underside of her desk. She looked over, there _he_ was. He, Dr. Shepherd, was most certainly naked. She was also most definitely missing some articles of clothing herself. Scooting herself along the floor, careful not to wake him, she should probably call him Derek now, she leaned against her desk.

"What have I done… what have I done… what have I done…" she continued to mutter to herself.

 **A/N: Sorry about the Guest reviews, I think I fixed it. Please accept this as my peace offering. I'll be trying to make the updates about this length.**


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: I want to start off with a HUGE apology. Being honest, I had trouble uploading this Chapter a year ago and just gave up. I finally returned to this and I'm good to go. If there are any problems, please let me know. From now on, I'll do my best to post every Sunday.

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"You did what?" Cristina practically screamed.

"Not so loud. I don't need all my neighbors hearing about my sexcapades," Meredith lay miserably on her bed.

"You can hardly call it that. It was one night. But still, I told you to find out how you felt about him. Not feel him."

"I'm sorry; I'm not like you, Thumper from Bambi's forest. I'm not a rabbit; I don't hop on everything that moves. Honestly, I don't even remember much of that night. I really don't even know what happened. I just remember the tequila and paperwork."

"Oh, now my feelings are hurt," Cristina feigned a sad face. She scuffed and pulled Meredith to her feet, "Look you and Dr. Hothead need to talk this over or else I'll end up pulling you up from the floor like I have been for the past two years due to that ex of yours. Quite frankly, my schedule just doesn't have time for that this semester. So you and your alcohol driven depression or vise versa need to fix this. I thought that's why you were you were taking that ministry class?"

"Well apparently it isn't working. As proven by exhibit A – naked Dr. Shepherd. I'm sorry my poor life choices aren't convenient for your time frame. Is there a better time suitable for this?"

"You know, you have a lot of problems Mer. I didn't think this would be one of them."

"Yeah, me either."

They walked back to the bad and lay there in silence not daring to speak or even turn on the TV. Time seemed to pass at warp speed because they fell asleep like that and when they woke it was approaching midday. Luckily for the both of them it was spring semester so neither had classes, it also gave Meredith a chance to catch her breath and try to figure out the entire situation. She was also granted a much needed break from the research facility. Dr. Hastings was not particularly happy with her that she had run a drill, practice or not, without his permission. Her exact response was along the line of: "I'm sorry, I thought you wanted me to do my job." Apparently, that go over well since that had bought her a week of silence from the man.

They sat together eating grilled cheese sandwiches and cereal since both lacked the skill and effort to make actual food. After about three hours in silence, it was the dark haired one that broke it after looking at Meredith's mountainous pile of paperwork.

"Is that all from the drill?" Cristina asked.

"Yeah, I already submitted half of it," Meredith didn't even look up from her laptop.

"Mer, this pile is as tall as your coffee table. Each of these papers requires some type of writing on your part. How have you not gone insane yet?"

"Who says I haven't? Why do you think I was drinking tequila that night? I have to file out a report for each personal's "death" during that drill. On top of that I have the actual incident report from the chemistry department. Then, I have the paperwork from the police department, and last but certainly not all of it, because I know I've forgotten something, I had the paperwork for the joint department detail with the security director," Meredith ranted each key she typed with exaggerated harshness as each word left her mouth.

"Well then, I can see how that would lead to someone sleeping with Dr. Hothead. I guess. Not really. No. Wait, Mer. This one says the person's cause of death is: Natural selection."

"Yeah, that would be Exhibit B."

"I'm sorry, what?"

"Last night's conversation? Exhibit B – that my ministry class isn't helping. Natural selection. Charles Darwin's Theory of survival of the fittest. Remember Bio 101? These people are first rate idiots," Meredith explained while finally giving up her report that she had been working on her laptop.

"Yeah, Mer, time to switch of psychology."

"I thought we both decided psych was crap."

"It is, but it has to be better than your ministry class."

"Well I took the psych classes while dated Finn, look how that turned out," Meredith gave Cristina a meaningful look and both knew to drop the subject.

"All I'm saying is we need a better system than tequila as a Band-Aid, this go round." Cristina surrendered, trying to ease the mood.

"Don't you think I know that? Right now all I can offer is avoidance to this. I promise I won't drink unless I'm with you because goodness knows that'll just land myself in more hard to explain situations."

"Good. Well know that I know you aren't a danger to yourself, I'm leaving now. So you can adequately destroy the planets rainforests one lockdown drill at a time."

"If they would've responded correctly, they wouldn't have died; and I more importantly I wouldn't have this paperwork," Meredith defended.

"Whatever helps you sleep at night," Cristina sing-songed her way out of the door.

Meredith shut the door behind her friend and was once again left with the remaining paperwork in her own personal hell. One look at it was all it took for her to realize that she was fully if she was capable of ignoring Derek, she was capable of ignoring that as well. So, she finally decided to address the missed calls on her cell phone that she had put off for so long. All fifteen of them.

"Massachusetts General Hospital how may I help you?" a kind operator addressed her.

"Yes can you connect me to the general surgical floor?"

"Yes ma'am, one moment please." Meredith took a deep breath and waited. She knew the direct line to the surgical floor, but she wanted an extra moment to breath considering she had put this phone call off for so long.

"Med/Surg how can I help you?" a much hurried tone asked her.

"Hi, this is Meredith Grey, is my mother around?"

"I think she might be in surgery, but I can have her call you back when she gets out. She's been trying to get ahold of you lately."

"I know. I've been… busy."

"I'm sure you have. You've always been a handful."

"Yes, well, if you could just tell her I called."

"I will. I do hope you are doing better, Meredith."

"Thank you. I am." Meredith quickly ended the called before the conversation could go anywhere further and make it more uncomfortable, if that were possible. She knew her mother had a habit of talking to herself; and since Meredith had practically grown up in the hospital, the entire hospital staff knew her life.

She sighed and threw her phone across the room. At least she could put off mommy dearest for another day. _Buzz._ Nevermind. Now, she'd have to put up with her now. She got up and picked up her phone. With a long exhale, she pushed the answer button.

"Hello mother," she greeted with little to no emotion. She liked to refer this to her "off switch" the mood in which she'd channel everything out.

"I see you've resorted to ignoring all your responsibilities. Including talking to me. Does this mean you're back to drinking? I won't pay for you to go to school only to drink and party your way through life," her mother greeted.

"It's nice to talk to you too mom. No, I'm not drinking again. I've been busy doing school work and actual work work."

"Well, if you're too busy to answer your phone you'll never make it as a surgeon. Time management is key. You need to prioritize your doings and what is required of you. Answering your phone for your mother of all people should be of utmost importance. At some point in life you'll need to answer a page at a moments notice assuming you'll even make it that far. I assume since I haven't received anymore calls from the police you've stayed out of trouble."

"Yes mother."

"Good and your grades?"

"They are good."

"Why not excellent?"

"I'm sure they are. We just haven't received our third set of exams back yet. I have A's in all my class right now."

"Well why not A - pluses?"

"We don't have that grading system here mom."

"Very well. I hope you haven't fallen into anymore boy traps. They are distractions Meredith. I raised you better than that."

"Yes mother."

"I'm late for my next surgery. I expect you to answer my next phone call. Goodbye."

"Bye mom."

She ended the call and closed her eyes. All-in-all that phone call went very well compared to how she thought it would go. She fell onto the floor and lay there until she was certain she could feel some sort of emotion again. When she could she thought it might be a good idea to take a look at her poor phone again.

Ever since that oh so wonderful night, Derek had not stopped trying to contact her. There were calls and texts messages galore. She didn't have the heart to block his number considering she did intend on contacting him at some point, she just didn't have it in her to do so yet.

If Meredith thought that Derek had put her through hell with his seven incident reports, it had nothing on what spring "break" had on her. Meredith renamed it Operation: Working Vacation. Quite frankly, she wasn't entirely certain why she paid for cable. She had her own private soap opera playing out before her. In fact, she had literally been drug by her feet into the middle of it.

Her pager had gone off two days after the lockdown drill. It read: _Biochemical – Code Orange 911_. Now, this could mean a multitude of a thousand different things. Assuming the worst, she rushed in and discovered that two women who happened to be fellows, one from the biology department the other from the chemistry department, had gotten into a cat fight in the room that held all of the biohazard chemicals. They effectively pushed each other into the glass cabinets breaking the walls and causing the samples to break and spill onto the floor, creating a hazard and dangerous situation for all personnel.

Not only were the samples dangerous, but they were experiments that were being funded by the FDA, so Meredith had to figure out what instigated the altercation in order to document the entire fight. Yes, her job had officially become high school consoler. So, one by one the people involved came into her office.

This was going to be a long process. Initially she had the girl from the biology department come into her office, Samantha. Sam was apparently the epicenter of the situation, but refused to tell her anything. So, Meredith had to talk to every other person in order to figure out what happened. The other girl, Angela, from the chemistry department, was too busy crying to explain anything. That was a dead end. That left one last person. Justice. Justice was the only witness. Apparently, Angela had confronted Sam in the chemical room and the two had started getting into a heated argument. Things started getting physical which led to glass breaking. In the final moments of the argument, only once sentence was heard, and that was Sam yelling to Angela, "you're pregnant."

Now, Meredith did her best to avoid drama. Seeing as now her job has turned into therapist, she really didn't have a choice but to engage in the drama. The next step she had to take, was find out why the girls were fighting and why Angela was assumed to be pregnant. She sat at her desk and stared at the growing pile of paperwork and notes in front of her. It was making her dizzy. So incredibly dizzy. She just wanted it all to go away.

A week later, classes started up again. Her job as safety director and therapist continued. She had put up a white board that outlined the web of a mess that was this chaos. It was like the West Side Story in real life. Shark versus Betas. One group of friends led by Rachel, the biology group, was in war with the chemistry group led by a guy named Jason. Ironically, Dr. Sloan was involved in the biology group which put Derek right in the middle of the whole situation as he was friends with all of the chemistry group. So, when Meredith got stuck trying to connect all of the relationships, she had to revert to Derek.

It was going on week four and still, Derek and Meredith had successfully ignored each other. Finals were quickly approaching and Meredith desperately needed to tie this up in a bow. So she decided enough was enough. She slammed her binder shut and got on her phone. She called the dispatcher and demanded that all who were involved be paged to the west conference room. After she was sure they had all arrived, she paraded herself into the room with a grand entrance and a thrust of the door. "I don't know the entire story since all of you have only been able to give me bits and pieces. Since only one of you know the entire story and that person is not willing to talk to me. Every single one of you are staying in this room until this situation is cleared up. That means, each person is hereby put on suspension until further notice," her voice raising with each word that left her mouth. She was pretty positive her blood pressure was also raising to an unhealthy level as well and the room was spinning. She had to hold onto the table in order to keep from falling down. Everyone in the room automatically bust into talking overlapping another. "The next person who talks will be terminated immediately. We've already had to shut down three clinical trials. I am in no mood," she threatened. One look in her eyes reminded them that she was serious.

"Now, who would like to sacrifice themselves first?" she asked, or rather demand. Not once person responded.

"Well, then I'll be taking the the people who I know had the initial problem. It began with Angela, Lilly, Jon, and Peter. You four in my office."

They followed like lost puppies. Once they had made it there, to their surprise, Meredith put them all in separate corners. She told them to wait one moment while she checked on all the others. As soon as Meredith returned, an actual vase came flying out her window. Yes, a vase. She managed to duck before it hit the wall and shattered into a million pieces behind her. "What the hell guys?" she exclaimed running into her office. Lilly was the one to speak up.

"Angela decided to get wasted to have her way with Jon and Peter a week before the code orange."

Meredith looked perplexed. "Isn't Angela engaged to Matt? Wait, I thought you were dating Jon and Peter was gay?"

"All of that is true," Lily responded.

"Then I'm confused."

"Well, the blood draw kit you found, everyone assumed it was Angela's because the HcG levels were high which would mean she was pregnant. But we don't know if that was really her blood anymore."

"Wow, okay. So that's all you know about the code orange?"

"Yes, and also Jon slept with Sam."

"Well then. I think we're done here. I'll just send in the nest group. You guys go home, except Lily. Try to keep your pants on. You'll have your privileges back next week. Consider this a vacation. An unpaid vacation."

All four nodded and left in one direction. Meredith sighed and was about to start crying when she picked up the phone when she asked her assistant to send in the next group. She sat down at her desk and put her head down. She felt miserable. Her body was not cooperating with her. It was revolting. Her stomach was churning and she knew she must look horrible. Within fifteen minutes, Lily, Rick, Dan, Mark, and Sam came into her office. This time she let them sit on the couch. She gave them a long hard stare. "Who would like to be the spokes person? I would rather not have you all speak at once," she said with an eerie, clam tone.

Dan volunteered as tribute, "Lily, Rick, Matt, Sam and I were planning on doing our own research project. Well, Lily, and Rick jumped ship because they weren't sure that the research grant would be accepted. Sam had never really trusted Matt, so she stole a biochemical from the cabinet and placed it on his lab situation so he'd get caught and get suspended. It backfired with his lab partner found it instead and reported it. The person who catalogs the samples knew Sam had stolen the sample, but since they were friends, she didn't report it. Well, Sam quickly put the sample back before anyone would know the difference. However, Angela had been telling Sam some secret things the entire duration of this whole mess and now she felt betrayed when Sam did that, and confronted her about it. They got into an agreement and the code orange happened. As it turned out, Sam had shown Angela a pregnancy that was positive. But, it wasn't Angela's, it was Sam's."

"So, basically you're telling me this was a whole bunch of high school drama? You guys are in your late twenties, early thirties. What is wrong with everyone here? Do you know how much paperwork this will be? What should I even tell the FDA? Not to mention that your research projects are most likely shut down. Sam, you're looking at jail time. Being quite honest, I'm still not even entirely sure what happened here," Meredith was just perplexed. She finally just dismissed them with no intent on reinstating their privileges. She was so done playing minister. They took her silence as a queue to leave. Meredith had never been so happy to have her office back to herself. She laid herself on her overstuffed couch and closed her eyes for just a minute.

"Meredith," a soft tone woke her.

"Mer," it tried again.

"Yes," she responded.

"Are you okay?" Derek asked.

"I'm fine. Why do you ask?"

"You're awfully pale and a bit shaky. Plus, you forgot about me in the conference room."

"That's right. You." Meredith sat up, but was immediately greeted with intense nausea and dizziness. Derek must've noticed because he quickly grabbed her trashcan a put it below her head. Her stomach proceeded to empty its contents three times to her utter humiliation. All the while Derek rubbing her back and holding her hair back in loose ponytail. She gripped the trashcan due to the fact it the only thing that was preventing her from face planting on the floor. When her stomach seemed to stop contracting on itself, she decided it was safe to get up and get water from the staff lounge.

"Where do you think you're going?" Derek asked.

"To go get water," Meredith replied, her voice hoarse and her throat burning.

"No, lay back down. I'll get it for you. You should go home. You can interrogate me tomorrow."

"I can take care of myself," she replied adamantly.

"I'm sure you can. It doesn't mean you have to."

"Fine. But you're overeating. This is literally just stress."

"I don't doubt it. I'll be back with water; and then I'll be out of your hair." She nodded her head and fell asleep immediately after he left. When she woke up it was dark outside but there was water next to her. Unfortunately, she didn't feel any better. She opted to just go home seeing as she wasn't going to get anymore paperwork done without vomiting on it. To think, having these research trials shut down all due to a pregnancy. Pregnancy. That's when it hit her. She had made a mistake. She knew she wasn't on the pill. Did they even use protection? Maybe she'd have to make a pit stop before she went home.

After buying two different brand of tests from the store and ignoring the judgmental stares from the cashier, she scurried to her bathroom. Five minutes later she was greeted by the most unwelcoming sign of the day. A plus sign. Well at least her mother would be proud for getting an A-Plus.


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: So, I'd like apologize for the brevity of this chapter. (And also being a day late). I wanted this to end in a decent place along with make sure certain were included. I promise next one will make up for this. Please hang in there, it only gets better.**

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Positive. Not once did the test decide to show up as positive, but twice. She was officially in crisis mode. No, this would not make it to Cristina or anyone for that matter. She wouldn't tell anyone. She could live in denial. Until the baby came out nine months later looking like Derek. She had to tell him. No, there was no choice, she had to tell him. He deserved to know. But, she hadn't talked to him in over a month. The poor guy had been avoided like the plague, the least he deserved was a word of kindness before she thrust the possibility of procreation on him. Tomorrow, she'd tell him tomorrow.

Two weeks later, she she found herself back at the hellhole that was work. Filling out another incident report, she had no choice but to make contact with Derek. _Rip of the Band-Aid,_ she thought. "Dr. Shepherd, can we talk?" she asked after it was clear they were through. His eyes lit up; and he immediately nodded. They excused themselves to a private room and stood in silence for a brief moment.

"I guess we need to talk," Meredith finally said.

"Yeah, we do," he said.

"I don't regret that night. At first I thought I did, but then I realized, I don't."

"That's good. Because I don't either."

"I'm pretty positive we didn't use protection."

"I know we didn't."

"I took a test…. It came back positive," she made looked directly into his eyes trying to gauge his reaction. At first it was unreadable, but then it turned into utter shock. He opened his mouth a few times, but noise lacked to come out.

"So, yeah… there's that," she broke the uncomfortable silence, "Look, I don't expect you to do anything. I can do this by myself. I just thought you deserved to know."

"I'm not going to let you do this on your own. Of course I'm in. I just need a minute. This is huge," he let out a large breath.

"Yeah, it is. Look, spring break is coming up. We can talk about this more then. Right now, I have to focus on school, come up with new ways to ignore my mother, and find the best way to lie to my friends. Since this is new and uncharted territory, we don't have to tell anyone. Especially since we don't know what we're going to do," Meredith exhaled.

"So there is a we?"

"Out of everything I said, that's what you pick out?"

"That and the fact it's no longer funny that they put the pregnancy tests next to the condoms," Derek still looked lost.

"Right, well. I'm going to let you absorb all of this and head back to my office. Alone. Without alcohol." She turned on her heel and left him alone in the room. Just when he thought he couldn't get any more lost, the automatic light that sensed a person in the room turned off. "Great," he mumbled, "now, I'm not even a person."

Meredith went back to her office and realized the implications of telling Derek. It somehow made being pregnant real. She honestly wasn't sure what she was going to do. She knew immediately who she wouldn't tell: everybody. Honestly, this was turning out to be like those crappy day time soap operas that she used to watch as a kid while she waited for her mother to get out of surgery in the hospital. She was living someone else's life, her life would never be this interesting. There just weren't words that could accurately describe this horrible situation.

She sat down in her desk chair and pulled out some of the latest safety protocols. If anything, she could at least pretend to stick to her work. Even though, her mind was still reeling, her body felt like it needed to be doing something. She'd run if she weren't so anti-running. Really, she was anti-anything cardio. The closest she got to a cardio workout was being incredibly stressed out and raising her heart rate to an uncomfortable rate. So, that was her plan stick to work. She'd bury herself in work until she needed food or the baby came out. Whichever came first. Honestly, what was she even looking for in her desk drawer? Maybe it was her bag, the protocol binder, her dignity, really any of those would be acceptable right now.

She was still looking though the forsaken drawer when she felt another presence in her office.

"So, I'm going to my mom's house during spring break," Derek blurted out.

"Good for you. Remind me that I have no family, why don't you? Thanks," she found her binder just in time to slam in on the desk. Wow, he life really was a TV sitcom.

"No, I mean. I'd like you to come with me. To my mom's. On spring break. Yeah. That's what I meant," he was pacing in her office making her dizzy and even more confused.

"You're inviting me to your mom's house?" She had to clarify because not much made sense anymore.

"Yes?"

"Are you asking me?"

"No?"

"I don't like this game," she stood up and put her hands on his shoulders. "I don't want to go to your mother's house. But, I understand the need for it. Yes, I will go with you to your mom's house." She spoke each words deliberately and clearly in order to ensure that he understood. With his lost eyes he just nodded his head. He seemed just as lost as she was. "So, I'll talk to you later. Yeah, later. And we'll figure out the trip," Derek said once he figured out how to string words into a coherent sentence.

Meredith gave him what she hoped was a reassuring smile. Then, guided him out of her office to rid herself of him once again. Sure, the guy would come in handy at some point in time, but not when he was just a ball of confusion wrapped in denial. She sat down, once again, at her desk attempting to relax. She would try to work, but she honestly wasn't even sure what she was working on. Maybe it was the clock that was making noise for the first time since she had moved into her office, but something finally made her realize what she had just agreed to. She agreed to go to Derek's mother's house? What was she thinking? Clearly she wasn't. If she had, she wouldn't have agreed to go to Derek's mother's house. Upon making the startling realization, she flung her head on the desk and wished the ground would swallow her whole.

She returned to her apartment to find Cristina eating her cereal. It wasn't a new thing. Really, she didn't own any other food that could be made. Even if she did, she'd probably just mutilate it with her horrible cooking skills.

"Where've you been? You said you'd get off work at five," Cristina asked without breaking eye contact with the TV screen.

"I went to pick up food," Meredith quickly excused herself.

"Oh? Where is it?" Christina focused on Meredith's empty hands.

"I ate it?" She was just making up things now. Really, she should've come up with a lie that would have at least been some what plausible. This was just horrible improvisation. She mentally slapped herself for being so obvious.

"So, you're acting weird. I'm just gonna go back to my apartment if you're gona act like this."

"No, no. I must've left it. Or I don't know. Derek invited me to his mother's house and I said yes without thinking. What do I do?" Meredith silently applauded herself for coming up with a better story. This one was a little more to the truth and also gave her a way to talk to Cristina without telling too much.

"What do you do? I guess you're going to your future in-law's house. But first food."

"I'm serious about this Cris. I don't know what to do."

"I was serious about food."

"Fine. Let's order a pizza. Until then, you can tell me what to do about Derek. I don't even know why I said yes. I can't do this. And stop calling Derek my future husband. Not going to happen." Meredith threw herself on the couch next to Cristina. She greedily ate a handful of cereal during her minor freak-out.

"You really need to get out of Egypt, Mer. You two already act like a married couple. Not just a married couple, but a married-35 years-two and half kids-home mortgage couple. And Pepperoni."

"What?"

"For the pizza. Pepperoni."

"Right. We do not act like a married couple."

"I'd be more inclined to believe that if you didn't have that look of disbelief on your face."

The two friends sat there a while staring the other down. Meredith did know the once Cristina had set her mind to something, she was highly unlikely to change it. So, arguing would be fruitless. So, instead she just picked up her phone to order the pizza.

"Since you're all knowing, will you tell me what to do about his mom's house?"

"I don't know anything about their family. But, I guess you'll know everything soon. Good luck."

"That's your solid advice? Good luck?"

"What else can I say? You're screwed." Cristina went back to flipping through the channels on the TV.

"Ugh. You're right. I am. This is so bad." Meredith flung herself to a laying position on the couch. Hindsight, agreeing to Derek's offer was a bad idea. She really did need to meet the woman at some point, but not now. Not when she very well had the woman's grandchild in her uterus. Speaking of which, she had completely forgotten to tell Derek about the upcoming appointment she had scheduled for the baby. Great, she was off to an awful start at being a mother.

"You'll be fine. It's just his mother. It's not like he asked you to marry him and carry his child," Cristina joked as she finally settled for some medical show. Meredith could only glare at her friend. It was almost humorous that she'd make that comment, but all the same, it was sad. Like, who says things like that? Apparently her friend did.

"Not that it matters. You hardly put yourself out there. I'm half convinced that you'll give birth like the immaculate consumption."

"Can we talk about something else? Literally anything else." Meredith was well aware she practically begging for a topic change, but really this was too much.

"Seriously Mer, what is wrong with you?" Cristina put her coveted cereal down and gave Meredith her full attention. If Meredith hadn't been in such a precarious situation, she would've appreciated the undivided attention of her friend. But right now, all she wanted to do was crawl into a hole and die. Really, this whole thing was like a crappy plot line from the medical drama they were watching.

"Nothing. Nothing is wrong with me. What's wrong with you?" Meredith accused Cristina.

"I'm fine. But, I'm not sure that you are. Take a chill pill. Or I don't get, get laid. Maybe that'll help or fix whatever problem you have and aren't telling me."

"I'm pretty sure that's what got me into this mess," Meredith mumbled to herself.

"What was that?"

"I'm going to go to the lab to work on my research project. Here's twenty for the pizza." She needed to get out of there. Away from her horribly ironic friend. She really couldn't blame Cristina for what was said, that was just her personality. But, she could leave. Even if it was her apartment.

"Fine. But I deserve explanations later!" Cristina yelled after Meredith who was fleeing from the building. With a nod to her friend, Meredith closed the door to her apartment and went to her lab hoping to find some solitude for once.


End file.
